Gross expenditure on research and development 2015

Scotland’s Chief Statistician today released Gross Expenditure on Research and Development (GERD) Scotland 2015.

The main findings are:

Scottish GERD was £2,150 million in 2015. In real terms this represents an increase of £23 million or 1.1 per cent since 2014.

In 2015, Scottish GERD was 1.46 per cent of GDP; compared to 1.95 per cent for the EU. The latest figures show that between 2014 and 2015 the gap, in total research and development spending as a percentage of GDP, between Scotland and the EU remained stable at 0.49 percentage points.

The GERD figures for Scotland break down as follows:

Higher Education R&D expenditure was £1,092 million in 2015, an increase of 3.3 per cent (£35 million) in real terms between 2014 and 2015

Business Enterprise R&D expenditure was £871 million in 2015, a decrease of 1.0 per cent (£9 million) in real terms between 2014 and 2015

Government expenditure on R&D was £155 million in 2015

Private Non-Profit expenditure was £32 million in 2015. The figures released today were produced in accordance with professional standards set out in the Code of Practice for Official Statistics.